The members of the commission were not wholly of one mind on all points, and it was rather a severe exercise of brain and memory to meet and satisfy the various questions of a company of quick-witted, logical Frenchmen. It was an exercise however, which left one feeling stronger and happier, because of the sincerity of motive which we felt animated the questioners.
Some days after giving our evidence a great meeting was held in the Salle des Écoles, Rue d’Arras. The hall was densely crowded. There was a considerable proportion of “blue blouses,” working men from St. Antoine and Belleville quarters, students from the Latin quarter, and some members of the Chambers and of the Senate, besides Municipal Councillors. There was also a good attendance of women. The several addresses given were listened to with extraordinary attention and interest, and in a quietness which was remarkable considering the mercurial and excitable nature of a portion of that audience. So keen was the sympathy (having its roots deep in bitter experience) of the poorer part of the audience, especially the working men, that it was necessary in some degree to restrain all that it might have been in our hearts to say on the injustice and cruelty of the system of which the victims were drawn so largely from their own ranks.
Another large meeting was held in the Salle de la Redoute, which was crowded with respectable working women. With the memory of all I had seen and heard in Paris of the condition of the honest working woman, hunted from street to street and from room to room by the police, and looking at the troubled and earnest faces all turned towards me, I could not refrain from uttering these words: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the honest workwoman of Paris has not where to lay her head.” Many burst into tears, or hid their faces in their hands. In coming out from the meeting, several poor girls came to me, their faces swollen with weeping, and said, “Ah, madam, how true those words were about the foxes!”
The Federation had met for its first annual conference in London in 1876, and from that time it has held annual conferences in various cities abroad or in England; the meeting every third year being called a congress, and being of a larger and more important character. The first congress, at Geneva, is described in the following letter.
To a relative.
Geneva, September, 1877.
I can only give you a brief sketch of the past week; full reports will be published. The anxiety which we could not but feel went on augmenting up to Friday. On Friday we began to see daylight, and all has ended well. Many of us are tired and stupefied for want of sleep, but at the same time inwardly giving thanks to God.
This Congress has been a wonderful event. There were 510 inscribed members, besides the numerous public which attended the meetings. It is, they say, the largest Congress that has ever been held in Geneva. On the first days people continued flocking in from all nations. There were Greeks who came from Athens, and Russians from St. Petersburg and Moscow. There were Americans, Belgians, Dutch, Danes, Germans, Pomeranians, Italians, French and Spaniards. Señor Zorilla, the late President of the Spanish Cortes, spoke on Wednesday, and was nominated as one of a committee to consider what action should be taken in Spain. On Sunday, in the cathedral, Pastor Rœrich preached a powerful sermon to a very large congregation on the question before the Congress, and in all the churches we and our work have been prayed for.
We always anticipated that when the final resolutions should come to be voted upon then would be the real war, and so it was. When the voting began, our faithful bands of ladies worked and watched in their different sections quite splendidly. First we had a considerable conflict in the Social Economy Section. Then came the voting in the Legislative Section, in the smaller hall of the Reformation, which was densely crowded. Professor Hornung presided. The discussion lasted three hours. Some lawyers were present, who are now busy in the prospect of the revision of some parts of the penal code of Switzerland, notably a young jurist, an able man who spoke well, but as a downright opponent. There followed a stormy scene, which the President with difficulty controlled. People of many different languages stood up at the same moment, each with a finger stretched out, demanding to speak. “Je demande la parole” sounded from all sides of the room. Mr. A——, the young jurist, made the President indignant by asserting that a resolution drawn up by him was not juridique. Seeing that M. Hornung is Professor of Jurisprudence at the Geneva University, and possesses the very highest reputation, this was rather strong, and I do not wonder it irritated him. But it did good, for it stimulated him to come out on the last day of the Congress with a splendid judicial speech, by far the best and clearest utterance of the kind I have ever heard in any country. We shall translate and circulate it. Hornung is a delightful man. He has that good gift of God, an enlightened intellect, as well as a pure heart, together with great refinement and gentleness of manner. At one o’clock, when we were all feeling the need of food, and our throats were dry with the dust of the room, an Italian advocate got up and declared there had not yet been enough discussion of each point. The chairman was aghast. He had expected the voting to be got over just at that moment. A kind of barking, House of Commons cry arose of “Vote, vote!” while the President stood open-mouthed, attempting to read the resolutions so as to be heard. A sort of stampede seized some of the German and Swiss members, and they made for the door. Half the meeting would have gone out, and so damaged the worth of the voting. So I ventured to shut the door and set my back against it, declaring that no one should have any food until he had voted! This half startled and half amused the assembly, and they all sat down again obediently. After another half-hour of discussion, it was agreed that we should meet again for a final voting at half-past six the next morning.
On the same day the resolutions of the Moral Section were passed very satisfactorily. Then came the Hygienic Section. The discussion here was so long that it was also adjourned until an evening hour. At eight o’clock that evening we all went to the hall of the Hygienic Section, and there sat crowded together, or stood, amidst a scene of intense interest, till midnight. Dr. Bertani of Rome took a leading part. Our ladies all went to the meeting; but they had been up so early, and had worked so hard all day, that by 11.0 p.m. this is the scene which one of my sons described as having observed at the back of the hall, “a long row of ladies all sound asleep”; but they had appointed a watcher—Mrs. Bright Lucas—who sat at the end of the row, and whom they had charged to keep awake, and to give them the signal whenever voting began on each clause of the resolution. Mrs. Lucas was wide awake, with eyes shining like live coals! We had prayed that God would direct this meeting, and it was wonderful and beautiful to see how the truth prevailed. Dr. de la Harpe, the President, acted well throughout. At the end I shook hands with him and Dr. Ladame, thanking them for their excellent words. Dr. de la Harpe replied, “You owe us nothing; it is you and your friends who must be thanked, who have brought us so much light.”
At the end of the Congress all the resolutions came out satisfactorily. We owe a good deal of this result to Professor Stuart’s tact and patience in talking to the different presidents individually. We think our resolutions are on the whole excellent as a statement of principles—clear and uncompromising; and shall we not thank God for this? His hand has been over us for good all this time, convincing men’s hearts and consciences, and controlling their words and actions. The earnest daily prayers offered up have not been in vain. These resolutions will be sent to every Government and to every municipal council throughout Europe. They have been telegraphed to the English press in extenso. My son George was charged with the work of telegraphing, and had necessarily to exercise much alertness and activity. M. Humbert is impressed with the excellence of whatever work he undertakes.
In the Legislative Section we had an energetic discussion over the seduction laws of different countries, and the recherche de la paternité, subjects not immediately in our programme, but closely touching it. The discussion became so hot, that it seemed difficult for some of the members to remain calm at all. Signora Mozzoni, a delegate from Milan, burst into tears over it, and one or two of our good gentlemen lost their tempers a little. One cannot wonder, for this is one of the important questions upon which people of different nations and creeds hold very different views. Miss Isabella Tod and Mrs. Sheldon Amos took a line on the point of the age to which protection should be given, in which I could not quite follow them, and I felt obliged for once to oppose my own countrywomen. Professor Hornung was pleased with what I said, as it seems it accorded with the views of most continental jurists.
The young advocate who had opposed us called yesterday to say that he had come round to our views, chiefly influenced by that desperate little impromptu legal discussion among the ladies. He had imagined, he said, that we were a number of “fanatical and sentimental women,” but “when he heard women arguing like jurists, and even taking part against each other, and yet with perfect good temper, like men (!), he began to see that we were grave, educated, and even scientific people!” He came afterwards to every meeting, and, as he said, weighed all our words.
I think I have not mentioned the resolutions at the Section of Bienfaisance, under good Pastor Borel’s presidency. Those also were very satisfactory.
Josephine Butler published in 1878 a biography of Catharine of Siena. A French translation of this was published nine years later at Neuchâtel. Mr. Gladstone wrote to George Butler, expressing his intense interest in the book, and adding: “It is evident that Mrs. Butler is on the level of her subject, and it is a very high level. To say this is virtually saying all. Her reply (by anticipation) to those who scoff down the visions is, I think, admirable.” We give but one quotation.
Here I must pause to speak of that great secret of Catharine’s spiritual life, the constant converse of her soul with God. Her book, entitled The Dialogue, represents a conversation between a soul and God, mysterious and perhaps meaningless to many, but to those who can understand full of revelation of the source of her power over human hearts. All through her autobiography (for such her Dialogue and Letters may be called) no expressions occur more frequently than such as these: “The Lord said to me,” &c.; “My God told me to act so and so”; “While I was praying, my Saviour showed me the meaning of this, and spoke thus to me.” I shall not attempt to explain, nor shall I alter this simple form of speech. It is not for us to limit the possibilities of the communications and revelations, which the Eternal may be pleased to make to a soul, which continually waits upon Him. If you are disposed, reader, to doubt the fact of these communications from God, or to think that Catharine only fancied such and such things, and attributed these fancies to a divine source, then I would give you one word of advice, and one only: go you and make the attempt to live a life of prayer, such as she lived, and then, and not till then, will you be in a position which will give you any shadow of a right, or any power, to judge of this soul’s dealings with God.
[CHAPTER XI.]
GOVERNMENT BY POLICE.
In 1879 her writings included two pamphlets, Government by Police and Social Purity, the latter being an address delivered at Cambridge. This year the Federation held its Conference at Liége. A bright and vivid account of the meetings at Liége, from the skilful pen of Madame de Morsier, is given in the Reminiscences of a Great Crusade, which shows that these annual gatherings of crusaders from various countries were not wholly devoted to serious discussions of a painful subject, but became occasions for true human fellowship (even touched with gaiety) between persons of divers tastes and experiences. The account concludes thus: “And now, little town of Belgium, sitting on the banks of the Meuse, surrounded with green hills, let me take one parting look at you! We have only known you a few days, and now you live in our memories a luminous point in the past. Many of us arrived within your walls strangers to each other, and have parted friends; some arrived sorrowful, discouraged, asking what would be the end of all this? They return peaceful, and fortified with the conviction that work is happiness, and conflict a duty. Manet alta mente repostum.”
The agitation in Paris against the Police des mœurs, referred to in the last chapter, had been continued, and led this year to the resignation of M. Lecour, who was appointed chief “bell-ringer” of Notre Dame; and this was followed by further enquiries and newspaper revelations, and the subsequent resignation of the Prefect of Police and other members of his staff, and later of the Minister of the Interior. In these events M. Yves Guyot and other members of the French branch of the Federation took a prominent part. Early in 1880 Mr. Alfred Dyer and Mr. George Gillett visited Brussels to investigate cases of English girls, many of whom were minors, alleged to be detained in the licensed houses of that city against their will, and with the connivance of the police. Some of these girls were rescued, and being brought to England, were placed under the care of Josephine Butler.